Joe's Chance Meeting.
Or was it?
"Hi Joe, it's been a long time! How have you been doing?" Selena whispered her words, perhaps, with more than a hint of trepidation.
Joe's hands moved to straighten his tie; seeking to display a confidence to mask his uneasiness, "Yeah, I'm fine...and you?"
"Well, let's just say I'm pleased to see you; although, I'm a little surprised it should be here at the Hilton. Not normally your neck of the woods, as I recall."
"No, I'm attending a seminar...new job...I have a new job," muttered Joe, while fiddling with the lapels on his jacket.
Selena afforded herself a wry smile at his awkwardness, "Still uncomfortable when wearing a collar and tie, then?" she quipped.
"Does it show?" He replied, feeling slightly less uncomfortable on seeing the wide grin that now highlighted her refreshing elfin-like features.
He has always loved that grin for it is a cheeky one with a certain 'Are you kidding me?' quality that had seduced him into loving her over many years. He called it her 'Ellen Barkin grin'; the type Ellen gives to Al Puchino in the movie 'Sea of love', when the latter puts on his innocent little-boy-lost look.
"Well, personally, I've always loved you naked, best of all, but that's another story," she teased, while looking warmly into his eyes. "Tell me first about your new job."
The quick change of subject had Joe flustered and fretting once more. Should he have noticed her at the bar, or should he, as he had done more than four years previously, just have turned and walked away. He had the feeling he might rue his decision to engage her in conversation. But, there were things he needed to find out about her, and indeed, about himself!
Seeing the empty wine glass in Selena's hand, Joe offered to buy her another, "Is that white wine that you are drinking?"
An old familiar feeling of being relaxed and comfortable in her presence started to ease through his demeanour. He felt much of the tension, within his body, drain away; in fact, a sexual lusting for Selena had returned to his loins. 'The attraction is still there,' he thought and that's something he had wondered about over the past four plus years!
Joe ordered a white wine for Selena and a whiskey for himself.
To break the silence that followed, he handed her the wine, then chinked his glass on hers and offered his customary salutation, "Cheers!"
"Cheers, Joe! I wish you well."
There may have been sincerity in her voice, but it was lost on Joe, since his mind was racing back over past events both pleasant and nasty.
"Shall we move to a table, away from the bar," he suggested, having noticed the barman was eavesdropping on their conversation.
"Well, sure! How about that table over there in the corner? It's nice, quiet, and out of the way!" Selena happily responded.
The couple stared at each other across the table each expecting the other to ask the question that would open the can of worms. Each, however, held their nerve waiting for the other to crack. Selena knew that in the past she had always held the upper hand in such protracted displays of will, and although a few years had gone by since their last meeting, that Status Quo remained the same.
"Why did you cheat on me? You bitch!" Joe could hear and feel the nervous trembling in his body caused by his angst.
"Why didn't you come home and ask me that question four plus years ago?" The harsh, crisp tone in Selena's reply emphasized a mixture of bitterness, defiance, and disappointment, "You forfeited any right to an explanation once you failed to return home to confront me! Even our divorce was handled through a third party!"
Joe took a huge intake of breath, "Let's just get the facts straight. It was you who cheated by fucking your best friend's husband! Now, I'm to explain why I packed my bags and left you. No way, no fucking way!"
"We could have worked it through, Joe. We always did straighten out the kinks in our marriage by talking. Why was the last time so different?"
"Are you kidding me? While I held that wanker down, by jamming my boot on the side of his neck, I asked him how many times and for how long had he been fucking you. He said for months and as often as you could get the time to be fucked by a real man!" Joe shouted.
"Shush, Honey, do you want everybody in the bar to hear about our personal history?" Selena reached forward and patted the back of Joe's hand.
Joe felt the heat of anger rising up through his body, as his face turned red and his eyes narrowed. He did, however, lower his voice and continued speaking, albeit, through clenched teeth.
"You haven't changed a bit, have you? That's why I just turned and walked away. I knew you would turn things around to be my fault, but I wasn't going to give you that satisfaction. I'd had it up to here!" Joe held his hand horizontally at forehead height, then continued to spit out his venom.
"That slimy bastard was so full of shit and so willing to tell me how good you said he was in bed. I had the last laugh, though. I bet he didn't use his pecker for months after the kicking I gave him. I heard his wife walked out on him, as soon as she found out about you fucking her husband! How do you think she found out? There was nothing for me to stay around for!"
"We could have talked, Joe. We could have worked something out, because I never fucked him; it was all talk on Jeff's part--just pure bullshit. Sure, I set it up to look the way it seemed, but I never fucked him. There's only ever been you! And, that's the honest truth! I loved you then, and I still love you now!"
"Love me? You must be joking! What loving wife fucks another man behind her husband's back; not that I could ever condone such an action, even if you had asked me if it was alright to fuck him!"
Selena sighed and softened her look, "I never fucked him, and besides, you moved away. You've had four years plus to get over it. Are you still that bitter about it? If you are, then I feel quite flattered for it means you probably still love me." Smiling, she reached for his hand and held it between the palms of her own hands, "I know it must have been hard for you, Honey, but believe me, I never fucked him!"
"Then why did he say that he had been fucking you for more than a year?"
"That's a long story, Joe, and one at this precious moment in time best left untold. I want to hear about you, and how you have moved on...if you ever have."
"God, damn it! I don't believe you! You fuck another man, your best friend's husband; an act that destroys our marriage and leaves me wandering in a wilderness of loneliness for going on five years, and then you tell me the story is too long to tell...give me a break, for Christ sake!"
Selena thought it incredible that her ex was still closing his mind to the many arguments that they had before she had been forced to take a win-or-lose-all gamble with her marriage. Oh, how she rued that day she forced her best friend's husband, Jeff, into helping her to try and shock Joe out of his complacency. She had come to the hotel today with a plan, and she was still committed to seeing it through.
"Joe, it's getting too crowded in here, and too many people are showing an interest in our business. Please, Darling, come up to my hotel room, or let me come to yours. We need some time together to talk this through more sensibly."
Looking at the sea of faces that seemed to be staring at them, he nodded his head and replied, "OK, let's go to your room."
Joe let Selena lead the way to her room. He cast his eyes over her fine figure and sucked in air, as he recalled the soft white firm arse cheeks that lay beneath that well cut business suit. He sighed for he was reminded that she has always dressed so smartly. Not only did she have the looks, she had the brains. She was the clever executive: he, the lowly blue-collar worker. He had wondered during his 'separation' from her what she had seen in him in the first place. That thought made him a little depressed. Why had he called it a 'separation'? He had divorced her sorry arse four plus years ago, hadn't he?
Selena closed the hotel room door behind them before slipping off her pin-striped suit jacket and placing it around the back of the upright chair standing near a small writing bureau. She walked to the mini bar and collected two drinks; one of which she handed to Joe, "Have a whiskey. It will settle your nerves. You seem so tense, Lover; perhaps you need a shoulder massage!"
"The drink I'll accept, but not the massage; that's too risky! And, I'm not your lover; there's another woman in my life now!"
"Yes, so I've heard, may I ask who she is?"
